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Let’s Ring in the Holidays Together

Can you believe next week is Thanksgiving already? I L-O-V-E the holidays, especially holiday entertaining, and YOU ARE INVITED! Please come—I’m hosting not one, but TWO afternoon teas in Texas the first weekend in December. Readers in the Houston area are invited to join me at the Hotel Granduca on Saturday, December 1, and readers in the Dallas area— please join me at the Adolphus Hotel on Sunday, December 2. Come celebrate the holidays, the newly posted peek into The Good Daughter, and give me the opportunity to thank you all for the wonderful reception you’ve given The Good Woman.

Each event begins at 2 p.m — please RSVP so we can get a head count. I hope to see you there! There’s no cost to come and enjoy tasty treats and good conversation. For more details and to RSVP, please use this link: Jane’s Events Page on Facebook.

Copies of The Good Woman will be available for purchase, and I will happily sign as many as you need for your holiday gift-giving.

Giveaway to celebrate the Texas Teas! This weekend only! NOW CLOSED! THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO ENTERED!

To put your name in the hat, just leave a comment on this blog post telling me what you enjoy about holiday entertaining! Whether it’s a tea with friends, or family-only traditional sit-downs, comment by midnight PST this Sunday, November 18.

Triple your chances to win: share one or both of the Texas Tea events on Facebook (direct links: Houston and Dallas). Each share will count as another chance to win Lisa’s book.

Winners will be pulled at random on Monday and the books and goodies will be sent out in time for you to have them in hand before the movie premiere (December 9 on ABC — trailer and book summary is below), possibly in hand before your Thanksgiving holiday.

All my best,

Jane

Lisa’s holiday book:

Entrusted with the guardianship of his orphaned niece Holly, Mark Nolan plans to marry his longtime girlfriend Shelby. But an unwelcome and tantalizing distraction appears in the form of Maggie Conroy, a young widow who has recently opened a toy shop at Friday Harbor. Mark is a cynic and a realist, but Maggie is a dreamer who hopes to make him believe in magic…

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I would have loved to have been able to go to the tea in Dallas. But, my husband told me he wants to go out of town for a truck show. He’s constantly fixing his up and hopes to show it one day. I will be glad to share the events on my FB page for you. I don’t do holiday entertaining at my house. I don’t know enough people. We just get together with family for the holidays. The thing I look forward to the most is sharing cookies and a gift with my neighbor. We’ve become closer over the years.

Love spending time with my niece who lives half-way across the country from me…we get together at holiday time however, and get out the board games and play…sipping hot chocolate and just having the best time being silly and having fun.

I love every aspect of holiday entertaining. This year I’m especially looking forward to having all of my boys home. I have 3 boys who are all away for college. It will be nice to have them all under the same roof again … even if only for a few days!

I love everything about the holidays except the traffic around the mall! I love secret Santa parties, cookie exchanges, Christmas music, and seeing old friends who have come back in town for the holidays!

When I actually get Christmas off (like I do this year!!), I head home to spend time with my family. We always do a big dinner of prime rib and mashed potatoes (my favorites) on Christmas Eve followed by all the presents.

Can’t wait to see this holiday movie! Watching holiday movies is one of my favourite thing to do during Chrsimas time. And go out with my family to cut down our Christmas tree. It is always so much fun to choose it, take it home, decorate it and smell the wonderful pine scent during the holidays. With a real tree we still find needles in the house till Easter, but it is worth it.
Wish I could be to one of your holiday teas event, maybe you decide to come to Canada for the Good Daughter promotion.

My favorite holiday entertaining is when we work together to cut down on the work and cleanup. My mother is 84 and she decided a few years ago that we would have deli trays and paper plates for Christmas dinner. She said time was to precious to waste cooking and cleaning. She still bakes her pecan pies, but no big meal. It is still fun to gather together and eat chips and sandwiches around the dining room table and them we throw the mess away and chat until late.

I look forward to spending time with family. I wait until the weekend after Thanksgiving and cook a big turkey dinner for my sister’s birthday. My sister cook Christmas dinner for us on Christmas eve. Thanksgiving day we will spend with hubby’s mother and also Christmas day. We lost his father last year in December. We all take dishes to these dinners.

I love entertaining friends during the Holidays. In fact I am currently getting ready for company from out-of-town for Thanksgiving. My son and another relative lavishly decorate our yard after we have had our Thanksgiving meal, getting it ready for Christmas. They go all out and faithfully get recognized by our Civic Club for their decorations. Christmas is a big deal at our house.

I love the holidays too. Growing up with had huge extended family gatherings and I really miss that. I have a great friend here that when her big extended family does the holidays in LA and not NO CA, I am always invited and it is so much fun.

I wish that I could go to the teas and I have shared them on fb. I have a cousin who just moved to the Dallas area a few months ago and I just sent her 3 of my favorite Jane Porter books including “The Good Woman.” I keep inviting her to the tea I hope she goes.

I am a sucker for all these holiday movies and I had already planned to watch this one!

Hi Jane, would love to have tea in Dallas ! Nothing better than good tea, and good reading !
I love the holidays, the lights, the food and the smells, holiday movies and especially books !
I miss the Northwest during winter, the trees and chill in the air. When I saw the book in the Give Away and Friday Harbor I remembered good times boating there ! This year we will be having a Cali Christmas party, Tamales, Posole and lots of friends and music at my Moms!

The holiday events in Texas sound fun, anyone who can make it should go!

We have several family birthdays in December, so the celebrating can be unending. Bithdays include my mom, my husband’s grandmother, my husband, and my daughter, all on top of the holidays. An evening with friends and our families, to enjoy each other, food, wine, some laughs – this is what we enjoy the most. Then we cap it off with a New Years Eve party. It’s a lot of fun in December, but I rest most of January.

I have about ten of my friends come to my house ,and we make Christmas Cookies all day. Then we share stories about Christmas and eat the cookies with coffee, tea, and hot chocolate. Great fun and alot of calories.

I love being around family. It’s the only time we get to be together in the same room at the same time. We bake, shop, decorate and have fun together. I also get to see my best friend. It’s the only time since her parents live in same town and she lives so far away.

I enjoy going through my recipes and cookbook collection to decide which favorites I will make each year. These recipes always recall memories of good times shared with family and friends. Family members who are no longer with us, come alive as I review and use their recipes.

Seeing the family is the thing that is most important and most fun to me. Holidays are just a special time of the year. this year, we have our first great grandchild to celebrate with. Good thing we aren’t rich, because if we were, that boy would have every toy that took my fancy!

My favorite way to entertain during the holidays is to make plenty of food ahead of time so that I can wander about and enjoy the company of family and friends. I don’t want to be stuck in the kitchen the whole time. Nothing is more comfortable than the warmth of those wonderful people. I learned as a young child that it isn’t the gifts but the company of those you care about that make the holidays special.

I love the holidays. It is so good to see the family all together. I miss the days when the kids were little and they were always around. Now they are scattered all over and they are oh so busy. I get to see them all for the holidays.

Happy Thanksgiving! I like the holidays,but its bittersweet too-December was my mom’s birthday on the 14th and then Christmas but she’s not with us anymore so I’ve made the holidays a nice one for my kids…and I like to bake and give the away as presents…sent care packages to the soldiers and other goodies, and then our church has a christmas dinner so I bring lots of goodies there. This year since hurricane sandy has hard sending books and other things that we’ve gathered form others and since my cousin is going up there again he’ll bring them to those that need supplies. It keeps me busy and I’m doing the work that my mom did when she was alive…my daughter likes doing it too so were doing it together. I’d love to read this book, I’ve read a few of Lisa’s books. I enjoy being around family and friends over the holidays..won’t beable to attend your tea’s this year, sounds like alot of fun! I wish you and your family a wonderful Thanksgiving!Enjoy!

I love all the cooking that come along with holiday entertaining.
I have already done some party’s for friends and family and I just love to get lost in finding the right recipes, cooking, baking and then finally entertaining.
Have a great Thanksgiving.

Oh how I wish I lived closer to the events! Will have to look at pics you & other readers will post! Best part of holiday entertaining is being with my kids, my boyfriend and my best friends. Everyone contributes something to our get together. Interesting what we end up with most times Will be turning another year older tomorrow. So started celebrating today!

I love NOT going shopping on Black Friday!! I do love when the whole family gets together at grandma’s on Christmas Eve and we play bingo for prizes. I save up toiet paper rolls and put little gifts in them and wrap them like poppers so everyone gets a little surprise to take home!

I used to love baking Christmas cookies with my mom, but since we live too far away now, I’m continuing that tradition with my daughter, even though she’s 3 But she loves helping! And we deliver the goodies to friends and neighbors after we’re done!

What I like the most about entertaining during the holidays is being with my family. We always cook for the family on Thanksgiving. It’s been a tradition ever since our kids where little. Now they are all grown and have children of their own.

I’m with you, I love these next 2 months. From all the traditions, cooking, baking, shopping, wrapping and just hanging out with family and friends. It just doesn’t get any better! Happy Thanksgiving from San Antonio, Tx. to you and your readers!

I don’t do any real “entertaining” for the holidays, but the meals for Thanksgiving and Christmas are both special to me in different ways. I always work on Thanksgiving so I can have Christmas off. As a cook in a retirement home, I’m the one who makes the whole traditional dinner for any of the residents who either don’t go with family for the day or just don’t have any family to go to. We try to go all out for them and then we all sit and eat together and they talk about past years in their lives. We always have a wonderful time! Then for Christmas I get to go halfway across the country to spend it with my daughter and grandson, which is my FAVORITE place to be I have 32 days til my vacation starts and I can’t wait LOL

A family tradition for us is to celebrate St Nicholas feast Day Nov 5th which is an important day for Dutch children. They leave carrots for the Saint’s horse and put out their shoes to receive gifts. We cook Dutch foods and the kids get typical Dutch candy and the festive foods that are traditional. This is the gift giving day and Christmas day is a religious holiday.

I love baking. The holidays give me a good reason to bake more and get creative. At Thanksgiving I feel like the wishbone. Both sides of the family expect us to be there at the same time because we live so close to each of them.

My family is all about the decorating. The inside of the house (tree, wreaths, candles, music boxes, etc.) gets done the Saturday and Sunday after Thanksgiving. Wrapped presents are expected to start appearing under the tree within the next week.

I am looking forward to the day you make it to Montreal, envious of the Texas people who will enjoy what sound like two absolutely lovely and fun events with you!

I love having my kids around during the holidays… only one left at home and the other three out and about, so it’s nice to have them all together. And, of course, buttertarts… I only make them at Christmas and they are so good… it wouldn’t be Christmas without buttertarts!

For me it’s family! Granddaughter Ashley home from college, holiday meals with all the favorite foods and family gathered around the table, excitement as the children wait
for Santa, and singing in the choir at the
parish church. I’m getting goosebumps just thinking about all the
lovely times to come!

Happy Holidays to you and your family, Jane! I love to watch football on the holidays. This year, I will be walking my sister across the field as she is a head cheerleader for the football team on senior day.

Happy Thanksgiving week…can’t believe turkey day is almost here. It’s so crazy at my house trying to get ready for my family to come in for the weekend. I literally had 19 people here earlier working—garage, yard, living room, bedrooms, bathrooms, you name it.

So okay–my web team is sending out the Lisa Kleypas books and they drew the 4 winners this morning and emailed them already and they have heard back from 3 of the 4 winners. Those winners were:

Sharon A
Rosemary K
Robyn Lee
Michelle

I also have winners to announce!! I’ve got 3 fun Fall boxes of Fall goodies…each is a bit different but they’re all packed with books and good stuff. Some have mugs, others have blankets, others have chocolates and Starbuck cards.

And the winners of the 3 Fall Harvest boxes are

#13 Anne S
#48 Gigi
#58 Latesha

So darling winners—congrats, and I hope you’ll enjoy, and please please send me your mail address so I can get your boxes out in tomorrow’s mail!!